Fort Worth daily gazette. (Fort Worth, Tex.) 1882-1891, 1887-06-22
BATTLE FLAGS.
Tho Partisan Character of the Radical
Outcry.

For q number of years the battle flags
that were captured by the Union force.
during the war of the rebellion were re
garded as a part of the rare show which
Washington had to offer for the delects
ton of the casual visitor. Together witt
the congressional bear garden, the IN
finished Washington monument and the
Arlington Heights, from which the Con
federates didn't capture the city, these
battered and nondesCript rags
have formed in years gone
by an exhibition entertaining as
well as instructive to the sightseer. Il
may fairly be presumed that so long as
interest was aroused by such display
there would be no disposition on the part
of the War Department authorities to dis
pense with it. The battle flags would
be shown, undoubtedly, as long as their
shredding fragments would hold together,
or as long as anybody cared TO look al
them. Then, after they should have
PISSED to the limbo OF things unrecog-
nized and uncared for, the time would
have come to pack them away where they
might patiently swait the greedy iron lin
gers Of the ragengines in some great
mill.
This IS precisely the disposition that
| from one administration to another was
made Of the battle flags which, through
The collapse of the southern rebellion, fell
| into the hands of the government at
Washington. Through score of years
| these relics served the useful purpose of
recalling heroic deeds and valorous feats
of arms wrought upon southern battle
fields; and at length there came d day
when they were rolled up and securely in
Cased, in preparation for the oblivion
which must fall upon all things perlsnable1
And if the Adiutant-General of the WaF
Department mad not the other day RUGBY
precipitated these old flags into the E6ng
since desertsd arena of sectional a1iifhos-
ity, and thus reaWakened old antago-
nisms they might have crumbled into.
unacceptable dust before any one else
would have thought it worth while to
have disturbed them.
The really instructive points of this
singular revival on the part of few hot
headed veterans of q spirit thatls without
lie or inspiration in the present may
be easily noted. 1t is evident, for one
thing, that TO the southern people it is a
matter of supreme indifference whether
the battle flags of the states
formerly in rebellion be returned
o. not. From every quarter Of
the south there have come expressions
like that Ct General Rosser of Virginia
"What IN Gods name do we want them
returned fOT2 Whist would we do with
them?" The new south is building rail
ways, bridging rivers, establishing iron
works, or! AIMING companies and
Syndicates for the development OF the
cotton industry, and knitting more close
ly the industrial ties which bind the re-
generated section 10 the other portion of
toe Republic. What, indeed, should the |
busy people of the south care for these |
moIderiDg ensigns Of lost cause, |
in that cause they or
Their fathers may have fought
braYely and to the end? This is
4 t an era of relic treasuring or of |
useless IamentGtion over Things that
might have been ard are not. And it is
Gut Il mark and assurance of harmony |
with the spirit CT the time that the
southern people should disclaim sll de-
sire TO repossess themselves Of banners |
which q quarter Of a century ago were |
carried through scenes of fTatricidal war
by the best southern blood of that earlier |
lay.
Another fact brought to the sur
lace in the stir over President CleYe-
lands hasty slip and quick recovery is
the peculiarly partisan character of the
cutlery which from many quarters has
been raised against the proposition
Of the Adjutant- General. Naturally,
any attempt to acquire political
capital from an executive mistake of this
sort must have Tesultedin failure because
Of q lack of belief in the allegations of
extreme partisans, end because of the
limited number of citizens
TO whom such an appeal might effectively
De made. 1t would be & waste of timstoj
consider what might have been the kbsultd
f this episode had taken place near theSl
close of heated canvass; yet Mr.. Clevark
snd's proverbial luck forms no incon+I
spicuous figure here. The damaggstfo
lis own political fortunes or to theES of
lis own political party may by judieious
management be either be turned to posi-
i've advantage or reduced to an insigniti-
ant minimum.
Beyond the considerations already
noted there is to be regarded the lesser
Ind inConspiCuous yet continually active
lgenCy of an organization OF northern
soldiers of the civil war. To most men
low verging upon middle age the era of
.ebellion is vague and misty tradition,
remembered as dreams are recalled after
| fevered sleep. Other aims and aspire.
ions beyond those which involve the
memories of civil war have engaged the
attention of the people, and each year the
ceiling, half clannish, half selfish, which
brings veterans of the war into formal
association with each other carries
hem further away from the basis
lpon which public opinion rests.
The result of this process, if
carried to an extreme, would be the
in one compact political
body of the heroes and the csmp-fOllow-
srs alike of the civil war. That such q
-esnlt has not as yet been arrived st ex-
sept in fragmentary sections Of the coun-
Try is the highest compliment which pub
ic intelligence cen pay 10 the patriotism
If the veterans. They are content to be
If and among the people; and all who in
heir names seek TO rekindle the dying
,mbers of fratrlcidsl strife they recognize
Is hostile to the best interests Of the ma
ion. The men who saved the Union are
generous as well as brave; and they
Jay, with General AveTill: "rhe fight vas
lot for q union of force, but a union of
hearts: and the PROSPEROUS and loving